Wallace Ludwig Anderson: OVERVIEW

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Wallace Anderson was born inHartford,Connecticutin 1917 where he received his BAand MA fromTrinityCollege. He studied at Harvard before attending the University ofChicagowhere he received his Ph.D in English Language and Literature, completing adissertation on Edwin Arlington Robinson.

Dr. Anderson became a professor of English at theUniversityofNorthern Iowa(then IowaStateTeachers College) where he publishedPoetry as ExperienceandIntroductoryReadings on Languagebefore becoming the Dean of Undergraduate Studies.

From 1957-58, Dr. Anderson taught in theNetherlandsthrough the Fulbright program. In1967 he received a Guggenheim Fellowship that allowed him to spend a year collecting andediting the letters of Edwin Arlington Robinson. Dr. Anderson became one of theforemost authorities on Robinson and published a book,Edwin Arlington Robinson, aswell as several articles on the subject.

After 25 years, Dr. Anderson left theUniversityofNorthern Iowato become Dean, and eventually Vice President of Academic Affairs, at Bridgewater State College(Bridgewater,MA). Upon his retirement in 1982, his lifelong love of art wasacknowledged when the college chose to name the art gallery in his honor. He died in1984.

ABOUT THE COLLECTION

The Wallace Ludwig Anderson Archive and Manuscript of the Letters of Edwin Arlington Robinson

Background
information

Wallace
Ludwig Anderson, respected Robinson scholar and author of Edwin Arlington
Robinson: A Critical Introduction (1967), planned to publish a
comprehensive collection of Robinson's letters, transcribed and accompanied by
annotations. A 1967 Guggenheim Fellowship enabled him to study Robinson
documents held by numerous repositories as well as private individuals. The
forthcoming volume was announced at the 1980 Modern Language Association
Conference. The news was welcomed by colleagues thwarted by Robinson's
difficult handwriting.

Anderson died of cancer in 1984
with the transcripts largely completed but the manuscript unfinished. The Anderson family donated
the materials to Colby College Special Collections in 2001.

The
Archive

The
Wallace Ludwig Anderson Archive comprises 30 linear feet of research material,
transcripts of Robinson’s letters accompanied by notes, photographs, and
manuscript text related to the unfinished publication. The transcripts and
accompanying notes, in particular, are an invaluable resource for Robinson
researchers. The archive is arranged in five series that preserve Anderson’s original
order.